We often forget that the quality, validity and accuracy of conclusions produced by computers will depend upon the input of information provided. Thus, predictability of future weather forecasts are contingent upon present information selected, and the computational analysis resulting in the future paradigm is founded upon current constructs, analyzed through the cumulative data previously provided, with a dash of witch’s brew and a genuflection of hope. In other words, the trash produced results from the trash collected; a rather self-evident tautology of sorts.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the issue of what information to provide, the amount of documentation, the precise wording selected, and the cumulative historical and current data introduced, will determine the statistical ratio of increased chance of success versus the possibility of an initial denial.

Receiving a denial from OPM is a down heartening experience, to put it mildly. Expectations are that the subjective pain or psychiatric stresses which one experiences, will immediately be recognized and become translated into a societal benefit through a monetary annuity, especially as Federal Disability Retirement is an employment benefit offered for all FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset employees in the Federal system, and upon proof and sufficient information and documentation provided, one becomes eligible for the benefit.

The difference between preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, on the one hand, and computational analysis of information in other sectors of information processing, on the other, is that an intermediate human factor is present.

All Federal Disability Retirement applications are reviewed, scrutinized and evaluated for sufficiency by someone at OPM, and it is this very human element which remains the “X factor” in all Federal OPM Disability Retirement applications. What can be done about it? It is simply a reality which must be taken into account, processed and accounted for. While bureaucratic and ultimately a rather depersonalized process, it is nevertheless an administrative system which must be faced.

It is as old as the ageless adage of yore, attributed to Isaac Newton: What goes up must come down; or, what information is provided, is the basis of conclusions reached, and it is the quality of information in culling together a Federal Disability Retirement application which is paramount in achieving success.

It is the personal encounter, the direct engagement, that many seek to actualize in hopes of fulfillment. “If only I could speak to the person”; “If you knew the real me”; and, indeed, it is that depersonalized universe which undermines and tempers. Somehow, if we are merely one among many, like the little girl in the red dress in Schindler’s List, the singularity of the living entity shouts at us for relevance, significance, and a chance to distinguish. It is in the personalization of the deep chasm reaching down from the inertia of life, from which the sacred emerges.

There is the daily monotony; the repetition of costs, conversations and couples coexisting; and then suddenly an idea conflicts, an encounter entangles, and life itself takes on a meaningful menagerie of sounds and magnified explosions of signification. Sans the sacred, the inertia of living would prevail. That is the true crime of a bureaucracy, and the administrative process which life imposes upon us.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who must file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, it is the sudden clash and inevitable tension between the depersonalized and faceless bureaucracy which one must face and submit one’s Federal Disability Retirement application to, and the sacredness of the most personal information being forwarded, which gives magnified rise to the anxiety of life.

That is the conundrum and anomaly; to formulate the most personal of narratives involving one’s medical condition and its impact upon one’s professional and personal life, and then to have the depersonalized experience of a faceless bureaucrat make a decision on one’s life without ever a direct encounter or face-to-face plea of persuasion. And the form which one must pour out such sacred information upon — SF 3112A, the “Applicant’s Statement of Disability” — reflects the depersonalized character of the entire administrative process.

In the end, however, one must always keep in mind the goal of the endeavor. Achievement is to reach and fulfill the intended goal. Filing for Disability Retirement benefits through OPM must by necessity involve the avenue of a faceless bureaucracy.

To reach the destination of purposive intent, the Federal and Postal employee must recognize that it is not the depersonalized world which will finally define one’s existence, but the recognition that a universe sans the sacred will manifest its humanity only through small steps of personal encounters, and that can be accomplished when once the Federal or Postal employee gets beyond the present circumstance, obtains Federal OPM Disability Retirement benefits, and moves forward with life into another vocation, another stage of life, and a further contact with the sacred nature of one’s essence.

Seven False Myths about OPM Disability Retirement

1) I have to be totally disabled to get Postal or Federal disability retirement.
False: You are eligible for disability retirement so long as you are unable to perform one or more of the essential elements of your job. Thus, it is a much lower standard of disability.

2) My injury or illness has to be job-related.
False: You can get disability even if your condition is not work related. If your medical condition impacts your ability to perform any of the core elements of your job, you are eligible, regardless of how or where your condition occurred.

3) I have to quit my federal job first to get disability.
False: In most cases, you can apply while continuing to work at your present job, to the extent you are able.

4) I can't get disability if I suffer from a mental or nervous condition.
False: If your condition affects your job performance, you can still qualify. Psychiatric conditions are treated no differently from physical conditions.

5) Disability retirement is approved by DOL Workers Comp.
False: It's the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) the federal agency that administers and approves disability for employees at the US Postal Service or other federal agencies.

6) I can wait for OPM disability retirement for many years after separation.
False: You only have one year from the date of separation from service - otherwise, you lose your right forever.

7) If I get disability retirement, I won't be able to apply for Scheduled Award (SA).
False: You can get a Scheduled Award under the rules of OWCP even after you get approved for OPM disability retirement.